BILL ANALYSIS
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CONFERENCE COMPLETED
Bill No: AB 49
Author: Feuer (D)
Amended: Conference Report No. 1 - 9/9/09
Vote: 21
CONFERENCE COMMITTEE VOTE : 8-0, 9/9/09
AYES: Senators Steinberg, Florez, Padilla, and Pavley,
Assembly Members
Bass, Caballero, Huffman, and Solorio
NO VOTE RECORDED: Senators Aanestad, Cogdill, and Huff,
Assembly
Members Fuller, Jeffries, and Nielsen
SUBJECT : Water conservation: urban and agricultural
water
management planning
SOURCE : Author
DIGEST : Conference Committee Amendments delete the prior
version of the bill stating the intent of the Legislature
to enact legislation to establish a 20 percent water
efficiency requirement for the year 2020 for agricultural
and urban water users. This bill now requires the state to
achieve a 20 percent reduction in urban water use in
California by December 31, 2020 and requires agricultural
water supplies to prepare and adopt agricultural water
management plans with specified components by December 31,
2012, and update those plans every five year. Lastly, the
bill becomes operative only if the other comprehensive
CONTINUED
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water bills are enacted: AB 39 (Huffman), SB 12
(Simitian), SB 229 (Pavley), and SB 458 (Steinberg and
Simitian).
ANALYSIS : Existing law requires the Department of Water
Resources to convene an independent technical panel to
provide information to the department and the Legislature
on new demand management measures, technologies, and
approaches. "Demand management measures" means those water
conservation measures, programs, and incentives that
prevent the waste of water and promote the reasonable and
efficient use and reuse of available supplies.
This bill requires the state to achieve a 20 percent
reduction in urban per capita water use in California by
December 31, 2020. The state would be required to make
incremental progress towards this goal by reducing per
capita water use by at least 10 percent on or before
December 31, 2015. The bill requires each urban retail
water supplier to develop urban water use targets and an
interim urban water use target, in accordance with
specified requirements. The bill requires agricultural
water suppliers to implement efficient water management
practices. The bill requires the department, in
consultation with other state agencies, to develop a single
standardized water use reporting form. The bill, with
certain exceptions, conditions eligibility for certain
water management grants or loans to urban water suppliers,
beginning July 1, 2016, and agricultural water suppliers,
beginning July 1, 2013, on the implementation of water
conservation requirements established by the bill. The
bill repeals on July 1, 2016, an existing requirement that
conditions eligibility for certain water management grants
or loans to an urban water supplier on the implementation
of certain water demand management measures.
Existing law, until January 1, 1993, and thereafter only as
specified, requires certain agricultural water suppliers to
prepare and adopt water management plans.
This bill substantially revises existing law relating to
agricultural water management planning to require
agricultural water suppliers to prepare and adopt
agricultural water management plans with specified
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components on or before December 31, 2012, and update those
plans on or before December 31, 2015, and on or before
December 31 every five years thereafter. An agricultural
water supplier that becomes an agricultural water supplier
after December 31, 2012, would be required to prepare and
adopt an agricultural water management plan within one year
after becoming an agricultural water supplier. The
agricultural water supplier would be required to notify
each city or county within which the supplier provides
water supplies with regard to the preparation or review of
the plan. The bill would require the agricultural water
supplier to submit copies of the plan to the department and
other specified entities. The bill provides that an
agricultural water supplier is ineligible to receive
specified state funds if the supplier does not prepare,
adopt, and submit the plan in accordance with the
requirements established by the bill.
The provisions of the bill only become operative if AB 39,
SB 12, SB 229, and SB 458 of the 2009-10 Regular Session of
the Legislature, relating to water use and resource
management, are enacted and become effective on or before
January 1, 2010.
Background
Under existing law, the California Water Plan is accepted
as the master plan that guides the orderly and coordinated
control, protection, conservation, development, management
and efficient utilization of the water resources of the
state. The Department of Water Resources (DWR) is required
to update the Water Plan on or before December 31, 2003,
and every five years thereafter. The plan shall include a
discussion of various strategies that may be pursued in
order to meet the future water needs of the state.
The Urban Water Management Planning Act requires urban
water suppliers to prepare and submit Urban Water
Management Plans to DWR every five years on or before
December 31, in years ending in five and zero. Among other
things, the plans are required to:
1.Describe the reliability of the water supply by water
year type (average, single dry year, etc.)
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2.Quantify, to the extent records are available, past,
current, and projected water use, identifying the uses
among water use sectors (residential, commercial, etc.).
3.Describe each water demand management measure currently
being implemented, or scheduled for implementation.
The Agricultural Water Management Planning Act required
agricultural water suppliers that supply more than 50,000
acre-feet of water annually to develop agricultural water
management plans by 1992. Among other things, and to the
extent information was available, the reports were to
address the following:
1.Current water conservation and reclamation practices
being used.
2.Plans for changing current water conservation plans.
3.Conservation educational services being used.
4.Whether the supplier, through improved irrigation water
management, has a significant opportunity to do one or
both of the following:
5.Save water by means of reduced evapotranspiration,
evaporation, or reduction of flows to unusable water
bodies that fail to serve further beneficial uses.
6.Reduce the quantity of highly saline or toxic drainage
water.
Existing law makes the terms of, and eligibility for, a
water management grant or loan made to an urban water
supplier and awarded or administered by the department,
state board, or California Bay-Delta Authority or its
successor agency conditioned on the implementation of the
water demand management measures identified in the Urban
Water Management Planning Act.
Under Federal law (Section 210 Public Law 97-293 of 1982)
all Central Valley Project contractors are required to
develop water conservation plans. In 1993, the Central
Valley Project Improvement Act Section 3405(e) required the
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Bureau of Reclamation to develop criteria to determine the
adequacy of the water conservation plans required by
Section 210. The Bureau adopted the criteria in 1993 and
the most recent update was done in 2005.
On February 28, 2008 Governor Schwarzenegger sent a letter
to Senators Perata, Steinberg, and Machado in response to
their concerns that his administration was unilaterally
beginning work on a "peripheral canal." In that letter,
the Governor identified administrative actions he was
considering as part of a comprehensive solution in the
Delta. Included in that letter was the following "key
element:"
A plan to achieve a 20 percent reduction in per capita
water use statewide by 2020. Conservation is one of
the key ways to provide water for Californians and
protect and improve the Delta ecosystem. A number of
efforts are already underway to expand conservation
programs, but I plan to direct state agencies to
develop this more aggressive plan and implement it to
the extent permitted by current law. I would welcome
legislation to incorporate this goal into statute.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: No
CTW:DLW:nl 9/10/09 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: NONE RECEIVED
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